


All This For Some Pepperoni Sticks

by disdonc (orphan_account)



Category: Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-19
Updated: 2014-11-19
Packaged: 2018-02-26 07:17:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2642942
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/disdonc
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>I imagine this sort of thing happens to Clint all the time when he's running up to the corner store. A short slice-of-life piece.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All This For Some Pepperoni Sticks

1.

“Bro.”

“Bro,” Clint Barton nods back at the kid sitting on the sidewalk, deck of cards spread out on a piece of cardboard. Kid. He was probably seventeen, eighteen. Should be in school but Barton didn’t go to school and he turned out great, right?

“Wanna make a little money?” Markus asks him. He picks up the deck and shuffles it a couple of times.

“Not sure that’s how the transaction would play out.” Barton takes a bite off the pepperoni stick he’d been munching on. In his other hand he has plastic bag full of groceries from the local bodega. Six pack, a bag of Cheetoes and another pepperoni stick for Lucky. Shit, forgot the milk.

“C’mon, man, it’s a slow day for me,” says the kid.

Probably because it’s Tuesday morning and you should be in school. Barton reaches into the bag and yanks a beer off the plastic rings and tosses it to Markus.

“Cool, bro.”

He’s almost done the pepperoni stick and is contemplating the one intended for Lucky when he hears a shout from a side street. There’s always shouting in this neighbourhood. It’s like the theme song. He’s tempted to just keep on walking; the Price of Right is on soon and even though it isn’t as good with Drew Carrey, Barton likes to catch it when he’s not out on a mission. Not ignoring shouts gets you into trouble in this part of town. But. Romanoff wouldn’t ignore it.

He glances toward the sound, sees a woman surrounded by three dudes in cheap suits. Muggers in cheap suits? Whatever, crooks have the weirdest tastes. A few weeks back a bunch of mimes staged a flash mob/terrorist attack in a subway in Europe somewhere. 

Balls. If this doesn’t take too long he’ll still be home before the first Showcase.

One of the suits has a Taser out and the other two are trying to grab the lady’s arms. She’s dropped a flat, square package that’s wrapped in a brown paper. 

“Hey assholes!” shouts Clint.

The three Suits turn toward Barton. He’s ready with a can of beer from his bag of groceries, flicks his wrist and launches it. One for Markus, that one. Four left makes for a decent afternoon, even if Katie stakes a claim on one. It strikes the hand of Suit with the Taser, who curses and drops it. Meanwhile, the beer can ricochets and strikes another Suit in the forehead. 

“Not bad,” says Barton to no one in particular, “seeing as how not aerodynamic a beer can is.”

He breaks into a run toward them. The one he beaned has dropped to his knees, clutching his head. Another has wrapped his arms around the woman who starts to flail and kick. The first Suit takes a swing at Barton who blocks it, spins and tosses the dude over his hip. He raises a foot to smash his nose, thinks better of it. Probably will get in less shit later if he doesn’t leave a body count.

The woman, dressed like she’s on her way maybe to a yoga class, has in her struggling managed to knock her assailant off balance and they stagger off to the side. Barton lunges toward them and slugs the one still holding his head as he goes by. 

The woman manages to get enough clearance to slam her elbow in the last Suit’s stomach and he lets go of her with a groan. Yoga Woman staggers forward while Barton brushes past, grabs the Suit by his jacket collars and shoves him into the wall of the building.

“Dude, chill out.”

“Let go of me you--”

Barton sighs and slams his forehead into the other guy’s head and feels him go limp. He spins around in time to see the woman pick up the parcel and start to run. He also sees the first Suit -- the one whose face he very graciously chose not to cave in -- standing right behind. With Taser in hand. Before Barton can react, the Suit jabs the Taser into his chest.

“Well. fuck,” Barton manages to say before every muscle in his body clenches in pain and he falls to street. 

From his vantage point on the ground, he see his discarded grocery bag. An alley cat has yanked the other pepperoni stick out and has begun to chew on it.

“Sorry, boy,” he slurs.

2.

Agent Maria Hill swipes a finger across the tablet laying on the table in front of her. She wants to punch it. No, not punch it. Smash it over the head of the man sitting across from her. The tablet didn’t do anything wrong. It’s done nothing other than display the data she’s requested. A glass of water is sitting beside the tablet and Agent Hill is willing it to turn into a whiskey and soda (except hold the soda). It remains steadfastly water. Nothing is going to go Hill’s way today, evidently. Windows on the tablet display feeds from a few different security cameras, some transcripts from eyewitness reports, and audio from some of the 911 calls are being piped to her earpiece.

“There was this crazy ass explosion and--” the tinny voice is cut off by her assistant.

“Agent Hill, Direct Shelstien from the Secret Service is on the line and he--”

“Send it to my voicemail.”

“Deputy Commissioner Marshall is on another line and--”

“Send them all to my voicemail.”

“Yes ma’am.”

The 911 call is back. “‘...dude jumps out of a window, man. Firing a bow. A fucking bow. What is this, Sharkwood Forest?’ ‘You probably mean Sherwood Forest, sir.’”

Maria stabs the tablet with a finger to silence the audio.

The man sitting across from her clears his throat.

“That’s enough out of you Barton.”

The liquid in the glass is still water. Maria brushes a few loose strands of hair back behind her right ear. Time-lapse photography might capture those strands as they turned grey. Her stylist calls that part of her head “The Barton Zone”.

Barton is holding his hands in his lap as though he were cuffed, although he isn’t. This is definitely a SHIELD interrogation room, though.

“Barton, you idiot.” To her own surprise, Hill sounds more tired than angry. “Tell me again why you assaulted three Secret Service agents on a Wednesday morning.”

“I didn’t know they were Secret Service, ma’am. Aren’t they supposed to be protecting the President or something? I --”

She holds up a hand.

“Wait. Let’s just skip to the part about the explosion in Manhattan.”

“Ma’am, I swear I had no idea a counterfeiter would have so much flammable shit -- crap -- in her lair. I said I’d help the Secret Service guys get the painting back after we sorted out which agency everyone worked for. And honestly none of them were that badly hurt. I’m the one who got tazed and…”

He trails off at Maria’s look.

“You’re rambling, Barton. SHIELD agents do not ramble.”

“But the painting was hardly damaged at all.”

“The counterfeit?”

“No, no, the real one. The plan was to steal the real painting from the Momma.”

“MoMA,” Maria takes a swig from her glass, remembers it isn’t booze, “The Museum of Modern Art.”

“Yeah, that one. So they steal the painting, word gets out its on the black market and they sell forgeries to everyone. Everyone thinks they have the original. Who are they going to call when they realize they were ripped off?”

“You burned the real painting.”

“Only a bit,” Clint squirms. He’s not one for sitting around, unless sprawled on a couch. “And mostly just the frame. Katie says she knows a guy. And art restorer. He--”

“Rambling. You’re doing it again. When I get home this evening, Agent Barton, I am going to mix myself a very stiff drink," -- wistful glance at the water -- "I am not going to watch the news. I’m not going to pay attention to explosions in New York. No fires, anything. I am going to find a movie on TV where white men get punched in the face a lot. When I read the morning paper there will not be a mention of a break-in at the MoMA. No art will be missing. No art will have a slightly damaged frame. Is that clear? You are going to fix this. Quietly. If there is even a peep, my morning coffee will be Irish. And you will spend the rest of your career in Thule, Greenland. Do you know what happens in Thule, Barton?”

“No, Ma’am.”

“Neither do we, because we’ve never listened to the reports coming out of Thule, Greenland because no one gives a shit about Thule, Greenland. We’re clear, Agent Barton?”

“Clear, Ma’am.”

A window pops up on Agent Hill’s tablet and she quickly scans through it quickly. Hulk. Berlin Zoo.

“Who authorized a vacation request for Banner?” she mumbles.

“The Avengers don’t technically work for SHIELD,” Barton says.

Maria Hill jabs her finger toward the door.

“Thule. Greenland.”

She watches Barton slink toward the door and picks up her glass. Soon, she thinks, soon.

**Author's Note:**

> This was going to be a longer piece but I started getting sick of it and was having trouble advancing the plot so I decided to salvage something and pare it down to a very short story.


End file.
